Fitness after baby and health in general

I’ve been feeling a little…”soft” lately. I hate it. I hate wearing jeans and feeling a little roll hanging over the denim. Ugh!

I don’t know when my body image obsession came into play but it was probably somewhere around age 14 when boys became an interest in my life. The fear of getting “fat” turned into a big mental anxiety of mine. It’s so weird to think about now. To think about 14 year old girls thinking they’re fat when they’re like 115 pounds. I think there are a lot of factors involved in this but I’m sure the media is one of the biggest problems. I won’t get into that though…

I will say this, my anxiety formed itself into a nasty sickness, if you will, and I’ve never been very open about it but I’m not ashamed of it either. Bulimia and Anorexia affect a lot of people, especially young girls. I’m actually glad that I have experienced something that is so consuming because I was able to shed that sickness and move forward. Now I think about our next child. What if that child is a girl? What if she has the same fear that I did at that age? What will she do? What if the child is a boy and HE has this fear? If we have a girl (or boy), I’m absolutely going to be honest with her about what I went through at that age and how I dealt with it. I think it’s so important to be open with your kids. I also think it’s important to teach them healthy eating habits and exercising habits at a young age. I think understanding what healthy means might really help them in the future. I think it would have helped me had I been educated on the topic. I will never, and I mean never, let myself feel or believe what I did when I was 14. Health is my main focus, my main concern, and it’s now a very positive thing in my life. I love that something so negative turned into something so positive, and something so important to me.

All of that being said, it’s been almost one year since I gave birth to little A and I have exercised about 4 times…I mean, when you have a baby I feel like you’re always on the move so you’re on your feet a lot and walking a good amount of the day. However, that’s not going to get your pre-baby body back. I’m not saying I want to weigh less or be skinny, this is where the image of a healthy body becomes blurred. There are healthy “skinny” people and healthy “bigger” people and vice versa. Healthy should mean what you put in your body and it also goes hand in hand with the amount of fat you carry. So what do we do? We eat healthy and exercise! I want to be fit! Before I got pregnant I was doing pretty good in this department and I want to get back to that point.

Now here’s the hardest part: how the hell do you find time to exercise when you have a baby? First of all, I work 3 days a week so those days are like, near impossible. Ugh, okay I guess they aren’t impossible but it’s definitely harder. It can still be done though! I’ve started walking at lunch with a few other ladies in the office and then eating lunch at my desk afterwards. It’s been really nice! That’s a good start on the days I work. For the days I’m home, it’s still hard but I think it’s much easier than the days I work. I’m one of those, “gotta cook and clean and do laundry and get shit done when A is napping”, so time is fairly limited when I’m home. I don’t have a treadmill or any equipment at the house so I can’t really use “gym-like” stuff while he naps, even for just a half hour or so. I could do some floor exercises on the living room floor, but that’s sorta boring and I get distracted by all of the stuff I have to do around the house anyway. But you know what, those are excuses. We have stairs, I could run up and down those a few times. I could put on some music and do some yoga. There are actually a lot of things I could do I just need to designate some time to do them! That’s the thing people, you have to make time for it! There IS time, I promise you that.

I recently saw online that a friend (who had a baby just a few days before I did) ran a half marathon. I was totally inspired by her. She works full time, trained for, and ran a half marathon all within one year of having her baby. I’ve ran 3 half marathons and I can tell you it’s no joke. I seriously can’t imagine training for one with a baby to take care of, too. Ai yi yi! But she did it! I’m not saying I want to run another half, but I need to do something. I need to feel better about myself and exercise more, I just need to. Although I’m thinking about training for one again, oh man, that’s a big commitment though, and I have a bad knee so that’s a problem….okay we will put that on the back burner but maybe I’ll try it again someday! Maybe…

Okay, my point of all of this is I’m going to start small for now. I’m going to set small goals because when I meet those goals, I’ll feel accomplished and want to set bigger goals, right? That’s the great thing about goals, when you meet them you want to meet more. So here’s what I’m going to do. I printed out a “morning workout routine” about 4 weeks ago and have I done it yet? No. So now I’m going to do it but I’m not going to MAKE myself do it in the morning. I’m going to allow myself to do it throughout the day, but I need to actually complete it! I want to do this routine everyday for a month, that’s the goal. I think this is a good start to a healthier me! Here’s the routine:

25 push-ups

30 crunches

50 second wall sit

10 tricep dips

45 second plank

30 lunges, each leg

and 15 squats

Do the routine 3 times!

I’ll add this last comment. If you fail, it’s okay! Get back up and try again. There are many failures in life but every now and then you will succeed and it will feel great. Go for success, try until you succeed, you can do it, I can do it, we can all do it! We were only given one body, take care of it! Now let’s go get ’em!